


The X-Files: The Displaced

by VulcanizedWriter



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Conspiracy, Conspiracy Theories, Crimes & Criminals, F/M, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Multi, Murder, POV Fox Mulder, Pre-X-Files Revival, Small Towns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-13
Updated: 2020-05-25
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:55:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 12,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23128156
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VulcanizedWriter/pseuds/VulcanizedWriter
Summary: Dana Scully and Fox Mulder investigate the case of Amy Weaver who, according to one witness, was murdered by a "crying woman" that vanished into thin air.
Relationships: Fox Mulder & Dana Scully, Fox Mulder/Dana Scully
Comments: 16
Kudos: 27





	1. Amy Returns Home

Wednesday, November 22nd, 1995

She had trouble deciding which paperback to bring on her long train ride. So, she packed all of them. At the station, she rifled through her options. The Great Gatsby. Jane Eyre. The Color Purple. To Kill a Mockingbird. When she’d purchased these at the campus bookstore, she specifically sought out the copies that looked the most worn. Creased covers. Half-torn out pages. Seismic wrinkles along the spine. These were well-loved, read by people who jammed them into coat pockets to read on their travels.

On rainy days, her favorite pastime was looking through the pages to discover which passages the previous owner had underlined. She’d rest on the thin mattress in her dorm and dream about why these specific words had touched them so deeply.

Ryan, her high school boyfriend, thought she was being silly. “It’s probably what their dumb professors told them to underline,” he said. 

She looked at him with disdain. How could he not feel these written words deeply - like she felt them? The summer of her freshman year, when she returned home from college, she broke up with him. She told herself it was because he had no ambition and was planning to just ride his father’s coattails. But, really, it was because of that conversation. She couldn’t be with someone who didn’t believe in magic.

Amy settled on Gatsby. She’d read it before but wanted to read it again; to commit passages to memory so that she could impress smart people in big cities. The hours seemed to pass quickly and, before she knew it, she was almost at her stop. She had a sinking feeling that she was forgetting something so she dug through the front pocket of her luggage. 

She hadn’t packed her toothbrush.

She’d remembered every book she owned. Emma. Lord of the Flies. The Catcher in the Rye. But basic hygienic necessities? Nowhere to be found. 

Amy laughed at herself. It was louder than she’d intended it to be and she suddenly felt embarrassed. She looked around to see if anyone had heard. That’s when she noticed the woman sitting across from her. She was lean, with a worn face and a streak of gray in her hair that rippled like a lightning bolt in the midnight sky.

The woman was staring at her.

Amy assumed it was because of her small outburst. She’d disrupted the eerily quiet train car by showing emotion. She’d startled this woman. Maybe the Bride of Frankenstein would give her a dirty look and move on. Amy shuffled in her seat. She looked out the window... or at least pretended to. In the reflection, she saw the woman’s eyes. They glistened. 

That’s when Amy realized the woman was crying. 

And she was still staring. 

Intently. 

Looking at Amy as though she were responsible for her tears.

Amy nervously stood up. She zipped up her bag and walked to the train doors. As they opened, she was immediately hit by that bitterly cold Illinois air, as it dug its way through her thick coat and filled her lungs. She imagined she was drowning. In the parking lot, she saw Heather’s car and quickly darted towards it, running down a set of metal stairs and cutting through a worn path between two bushes. She ripped open the passenger side, turned the heater on full blast and practically held her face against it. Heather laughed as a pair of griddle marks appears on Amy’s fair skin, as though she were a hamburger.

“Nice to see you again,” Heather said.

She smiled. “Nice to see you, too.”

Amy had not been back to her hometown in three years. But, sitting here, in Heather’s car, she felt a wave of nostalgia pass over her. She closed her eyes and, suddenly, she was transported back to high school. She was sitting in the backseat, holding her ex-boyfriend’s hand. As she focused, she could smell the stale cigarettes clinging to his shirt and the cologne he used to mask it. She felt his hand go to her thigh. It was a warm summer day and the sun penetrated the window and warmed her skin. In the front seat, Heather’s boyfriend Tom fiddled with the car radio. Rush Rush by Paula Abdul was playing. Heather sang along with it. It was loud but it was joyous. 

Amy opened her eyes… but she was still in high school. It was absorbing her, as though she were sinking into quicksand. She felt herself claw her way out of that reality and back to the present day. She awoke to a sound ringing in her ears…

“Are you okay? Amy, are you okay?”

Amy looked up to see Heather, bathed in a red light. They were stopped at one of the five intersections in their town. 

“Yes,” Amy said. “I’m fine.” But, was she? She could still feel the warmth of the sun… even in the cold darkness.

They went to Kelly’s Tavern. The only bar in town. Because it was the night before Thanksgiving, the crowd was made up of everyone they went to high school with, many of them returning for one last outing during their senior year of college. And, just like high school, the familiar cliques gathered. In one corner, she spied a group of jocks glued to the Chicago Bulls game, where they faced off against the San Antonio Spurs. In another, the ones who hated this town, and couldn’t wait to get out, but never backed up their talk with action.

When they pulled into the parking lot, Heather told Amy that she should let loose tonight. “I’ll be D.D.,” she said to her. “You have fun.” 

At first, Amy demurred. But, as she looked out on the sea of sour faces of her former high school classmates, she realized that drinking was the answer. As she ingested her second vodka and Coke, she was starting to feel a little more relaxed. She put down her empty glass. The bartender took it away and a new drink materialized on a small cocktail napkin in front of her. She looked up at him.

“I didn’t order this,” she said to him.

“Guy over there ordered it for you.”

Amy looked up to see Ryan, her ex-boyfriend, staring at her from across the bar. As he looked at her, he managed to eek out a smile. He was trying to appear warm. Friendly. But she saw right through him. 

“I’d rather not accept,” Amy said.

“He already paid for it and I already poured it.”

“Give him his money back,” she said. “I can pay for it myself.”

After her third vodka and Coke, Ryan walked over to her. He placed his hand on her shoulder. “You’re going to ignore me all night?” he asked.

“That was my plan,” she responded.

“I’m happy to see you,” he said.

“I’m not going to do this here.”

“You broke up with me. Shouldn’t I be the one who’s upset?” he said.

“I have to go talk to Heather,” she said.

But he didn’t move his hand from her shoulder.

“You already embarrassed me once tonight,” he said, the seven beers he’d had regurgitating up his throat. “Don’t embarrass me again,” he said.

“Get OFF of me,” Amy yelled as she pushed his hand off of her. Everything seemed to stop when she did that. She could feel a dozen set of eyes looking at her.

Amy was ready to go home. She looked for Heather and found her in the back of the bar the group of kids that they used to call “the burnouts.” Amy could tell, right away, that Heather was in a bad state.

“What are you doing?” she asked her.

“I was just having fun.”

“You said you’d drive me home,” Amy said, through gritted death.

“Oh, you’re mad at me? You know, after this weekend, you’re leaving. I’ll probably never see you again,” Heather said. “I don’t owe you anything.”

Amy turned and left the bar. After a few minutes, her hands stopped shaking from anger. That was when she realized that this was all for the best. She was shedding the weight of her hometown. She was eager to forget it all. Forget everything. Carve out a new existence for herself somewhere else. It was time. Then, she smiled, as she realized what she wanted to do --- 

She wanted to see the world.

As it turned out, this would be the last happy thought she ever had. Behind her, she heard a voice. It simply said her name.

“Amy.”

Amy turned around. She didn’t see anyone. Maybe it was in her head. She shook it off and continued walking. 

Then, she heard it again.

“Amy.”

She was sure of it this time. She turned around and saw a woman standing in the snow, as though she were floating on it. It was her. The woman from the train. The one with the lightning bolt of gray in her hair.

They looked at each other. There was a pause. The woman was taking her in. Looking her up and down. And, she was crying. She was definitely crying. Amy could see it clearly this time. The tears ran down her face as though they had been there for decades, burned into her skin. 

“This is the night,” the crying woman said. 

“Wh-what are you talking about?” Amy asked.

The crying woman got closer. “It’s finally over,” she whispered.

“I - I have to go,” Amy said.

She tried to run but the woman knew her every move. Soon, she felt the woman’s grip on her arm, her fingernails digging through her down coat and gripping her skin.

“Please, stop! You’re hurting me!”

Again, the woman said, “It’s over now.”

Amy was so focused on the burning pain, she didn’t see the woman was holding a knife.

Ryan threw open the door and pounded his feet on the sidewalk. He could feel his heart pushing up against his skin, trying to escape. He took quick, short breaths that seemed to do the opposite of what he intended them to do. Had he ever been this angry before? He wasn’t sure. 

But he wasn’t about to let Amy embarrass him. 

She thought she was better than him?

This girl whose father worked at a shoe store and mother worked at the hospital cafeteria. She thought that she was better than him. She thought it was okay to embarrass him in front of all of his friends?

He could feel the impact of each step. Slamming into his body. He was going to catch up to her. He was going to hurt her. He didn’t know how badly. But he knew when he caught up to her, she was in trouble.

And then he stopped. Because there she was. Slick red blood staining her coat.

“What the hell…” Ryan said to himself.

His vision started to blur. He was going to pass out. He righted himself. He had to pay attention. He had to wake up. 

There was a woman. Standing next to Amy. Holding a knife over her body. Crying.

“What --- What did you do?!”

The woman stared at Ryan. She said simply, “You can’t hurt her anymore.” Ryan watched as the woman faded away, piece by piece, cell by cell, into nothingness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Chapter: Dana Scully is on the case.


	2. Rising Sun Radio

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dana Scully arrives in this sleepy small town to investigate the murder of Amy Weaver.

Dana Scully descended into the bowels of hell. 

Through her years at the Federal Bureau of Investigation, she had survived unimaginable horrors. She had experienced moments that made her believe that monsters were real; that evil never truly died. But, nothing had prepared her for this awful place. Her senses were overwhelmed by the smells. Burnt tires. Rotting garbage. Her medical background identified the specific odor of animals that were trapped somewhere between dying and death. 

She couldn’t get distracted. She needed to focus on her goal. In a small enclosure she saw the one that ruled over this dismal place. It appeared to be asleep. Its breaths were deep and labored. If it had ever taken one with ease, she would have been surprised.

Scully approached him with confidence, pushing the door so hard she was afraid that she’d put a dent in the cheap drywall. The creature jumped a full foot in the air and as it was arching down, Scully leaned in and stated her purpose for being there.

“I rented the silver Dodge Neon.”

The rental agent opened his eyes, quickly. So quickly, in fact, that Scully mistakenly thought this ordeal would be over promptly.

That would not be the case.

He slowly moved his Funyon-stained fingers over the Funyon-stained keyboard and searched through the records on his computer for that make and model of car. When he couldn’t find it, even after several tries, he resorted to a new method. 

“Uh, name?” he asked.

Scully presented her F.B.I. badge. She had to hold it up for nearly a minute so that he could read it. He pecked it into the system, letter by letter, like a bird attacking a leftover sandwich on the beach. 

D-A-N-A S-C-U-L-L-Y.  
He gave her a small envelope. Inside were the keys. Scully walked through the garage and found the car. She put the key into the ignition, turned up the heat and drove out of the garage, level by level, until she was back on solid ground. 

The car’s headlights revealed nothing but inky darkness. Because her flight had been delayed by three hours, she now found herself in that specific time of night that happened to be both late and early…

That also happened to be the precise time when she and her partner did their best work.

It was a two hour drive to this small town. Why did it always have to be these places? Always covered in fog. Always under a blanket of darkness. Had she seen the sun since she joined The X-Files? She wasn’t so sure. Her partner seemed to live and breathe “windowless rooms” and “pitch black skies.” She, on the other hand, was constantly popping Vitamin D and dreaming of at least one vacation day spent in the sunlight.

A song crackled over the radio. Finally. Scully had been flipping through the dials searching for something, anything, to accompany her. She’d lost the signal on the FM station ten minutes ago and, since then, had made several fruitless attempts to find another station.

The song she heard was “Land of the Rising Sun,” by The Animals. She settled into it, remembering its longing tone. Then she heard a voice that sounded like it had been stained by years of cigarettes, red meat and hard liquor. Its baritone was able to rip through the static as though it were tracing paper. He was clear as a bell. She now realized that the song was just the intro to a talk radio show.

“Hello humans, aliens, monsters and creatures of the night. This is Rising Sun Radio and, as always, I am your intrepid host, Peter Stack. We will spend those magical hours between darkness and light exploring that which is unknown and unexplained; mysterious and otherworldly. We will pull together the pieces of this puzzle that we call the universe to make sense of the unknowable. Join us, won’t you?”

It seemed as though Mulder followed her everywhere.

Peter Stack began the show with a cassette tape that he had received from a source who wanted to remain anonymous. He claimed to have unearthed a secret language spoken between a family of hairy, upright walking, ape-like creatures.

“Folks, we’re talking about Bigfoot here,” Stack said for added clarification.

Scully listened to the barely audible recording which featured animals “whooping” and “hollering” into the night. Stack described these as “blood-curdling screams.” To Scully, they sounded more like tired rodents. It was about as convincing as the old Patterson-Gimlin film of a bigfoot walking by the camera like it was on its way to a casual lunch date.

As the tape stopped, Stack chimed in with his particular brand of scientific analysis. “Wow!” he said, repeatedly. “You heard the audio… What else could that be but a Bigfoot?!”

Scully rolled her eyes so hard that they felt like they were scraping up against her brain.

Stack continued to talk about Bigfoot for the next five minutes, alternating nicknames like “Yeti” and “Sasquatch.” He mentioned that years ago he had come into contact with a hunter who had shot and killed a Bigfoot and buried it in an undisclosed location. Stack added, “This man drew me an intricate map of the location of this sasquatch-ian corpse. Now, many people have asked me why I don’t just dig it up - maybe submit the DNA evidence to those scientists from the OJ trial. But, unfortunately, I made a solemn promise, an oath to take this secret location to my grave.”

Stack played another song, this time “She’s Like a Rainbow” by the Rolling Stones. Then, he opened up the show to callers. The first caller said he was a taxi driver named Eddie. He said he had information he received from a passenger that the government had put tracking devices in dollar bills. 

“They want to know where we’re going and who we’re going with,” Eddie said.

“Why would they want to know that?” Peter asked.

“So that they can blackmail us!” Eddie said.

If you knew how little the government cared about you, your feelings would be hurt, Scully thought to herself. She speculated that the man was feeling guilty about stepping out on his wife. This hunch was confirmed when the man casually said, “Even if you cheat on your old lady, they know! Bill Clinton knows everything!”

The next caller was a man who claimed to be God. Stack asked, “We had a God that called in last week. Was that you?” The man said it was not him. Stack continued, “Then, are there multiple gods, like in Greek mythology?” The caller hung up.

Scully had been mildly amused by this show but now she was about ready to give up. She reached for the tune knob just as Stack said, “We have another caller. He is calling collect from a payphone… he says from a bus station. My producer tells me that we are going to accept those charges.” 

Then, Scully heard the man’s voice. Her hand froze over the dial then retreated back to the steering wheel. 

“Mr. Stack, please, I need your help,” he said. Scully could tell immediately that this man appeared to be in genuine distress.

“And, I am here,” Stack said. 

“Thank you,” the caller said, simply.

“Can I have your name?”

“You can call me David,” he said.

“Is that your real name?” Stack asked.

“No,” David responded.

“I understand,” Stack said. “Why are you calling?” he asked.

“I remember your show… Remember it from when I was a kid.”

“So, you’re a longtime listener,” Stack asked.

“Yes,” David said. “After the… um... incidents started to happen, I would lie in bed and listen to your show until the sun came up... I was scared to be alone in the dark. He always hurt me in the dark. I know you won’t judge me... I know you’ll listen to what I have to say.”

“And I am listening,” Stack said. “David, whatever you have to say, you can tell me.”

David breathed in and out, audibly, into the phone. He sounded like he was crying. “I’m not supposed to be here,” he said. 

“What do you mean, David?” Stack asked. Scully noted the way Stack engaged his guests, always calling them by their names, like a therapist trying to create a bond with their patient.

“This is not my world, anymore,” David said.

“David, are you a visitor from another planet?”

“No, Mr. Stack. Not that.”

“Then, what are you?”

“I’m…” he stopped. He took a breath. He searched for the right word. Then, he found it. “I’m displaced. We are all displaced.”

Through her years in law enforcement, Scully found that she could almost instantaneously tell if a person was lying or telling the truth. As strange as David’s call was, she believed that he was being honest. But, in her mind, he was suffering from some sort of psychosis. 

“Displaced from what, David?” Stack asked.

“It’s complicated,” David said. “It’s hard to explain.”

“You said ‘we.’ ‘We are all displaced.’ Does that mean there’s more of you?” the host asked. 

“Yes,” David said. “More. Wandering around in the night. Knowing what we have to do.”

“I’m assuming you’re telling me this, David, because you don’t want to do what you have to do.”

“Yes. But, it’s not just that,” David said.

“Then, what?” Stack asked.

“She used to listen to your show too. I need her to hear this.”

“There’s a woman,” Stack said, milking this moment for too much drama. “You’re trying to reach her before she can do something bad. Is that it, David? What’s she going to do, David?” 

The radio crackled. Scully thought she had lost the broadcast. Then, Stack returned.

“Listeners, I apologize, it appears as though we are having some difficulties with the connection. We’re going to try to get ‘David’ back but in the meantime, let’s go to Rick in Keensburg. Rick, you’re on Rising Sun Radio with Peter Stack.”

Scully, finally, had enough. She turned off the radio and pulled into the next open gas station. She poured herself a large cup of coffee. She found a bin of old cassette tapes and dug through them. Motown. ‘50s Doo-Wop. She settled on Willie Nelson. It wasn’t her favorite but it would have to do. She still had an hour drive ahead of her and she wasn’t particularly interested in spending more time with Peter Stack.

Scully brought her items to the cashier, who had just removed a large bowl of mashed potatoes from the microwave.

“Looks appetizing,” she said to him, sarcastically.

“Happy almost Thanksgiving,” he shrugged. He rang her up and said, “That will be five dollars and seventeen cents.”

Scully looked down at the register. She saw an item and made an impulse buy. 

“I’ll also take this bag of sunflower seeds,” she said to the cashier.

This particular item was a gift.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Chapter: Fox Mulder haunts a parking lot.


	3. Fox Mulder Haunts a Parking Lot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Scully arrives in town and Mulder briefs her on the details in the murder of Amy Weaver, including reports of a strange, crying woman.

Special Agent Fox Mulder could see the headlights approaching from a distance. They were the first pair he’d seen since the Sheriff arrived four hours ago. He was certain they belonged to his partner. He paced back and forth in the snow, waiting for her. In his mind, this investigation wouldn’t start until she was here. 

As Scully’s rental car pulled into the snowy parking lot of Kelly’s Pub, he could hear the distinct sounds of Willie Nelson. She rolled down her window.

“Scully, I didn’t take you for a country girl,” he said.

“It was either this or listen to your specific brand of entertainment,” she said.

“They put that stuff on audio cassettes now?” he asked, sheepishly.

“No, your “other” specific brand of entertainment,” she said. “Rising Sun Radio, filling your head with nonsense until the sun rises.”

“I know that one!” Mulder said, excitedly. “Langley gave me some tapes. Peter Stack’s voice has lulled me to sleep one too many nights.”

“Thank you for that window into your personal life,” his acerbic partner said. She opened the door and left the engine running. As she stepped outside, she bristled. The temperature was hovering around zero.

“Would it kill you to look for X-Files in warmer climates?” she said as she pulled the neck of her coat up.

“I don’t look for them, Scully. They look for me. And this one is a whopper… with extra mayo,” Mulder said.

“I’m assuming that means you’re going to do a great deal of talking,” Scully asked.

“That was my plan, yes,” Mulder said.

She gestured to her rental car. “Well, hop in. The car’s warm and the music is your speed.”

Mulder sat in the passenger seat as Scully went back to the driver’s side. She rolled up her window and listened as Mulder spoke of the crime scene.

“The deceased’s name is Amy Weaver. Senior at Florida State. She came back home for Thanksgiving. Looks like there’s going to be an empty seat at the table,” Mulder said. 

‘How was she killed?” Scully asked.

“Throat was cut.”

“Crime of passion?”

“Perhaps.”

“Witnesses?”

“They said she was in good spirits for most of the night.”

“I’m sensing a ‘but.’”

“She ran into an ex-boyfriend.”

“I’m guessing he wasn’t happy to see her.”

“There was an altercation.”

“In this bar.”

“Yes.”

“On the night before Thanksgiving.”

“Correct.”

“Am I right to then assume that this bar was crowded?”

“According to the owner... ‘very.’”

“Am I right to assume that ‘many’ people saw this altercation?” Scully asked.

“You are,” Mulder said.

“Did it get physical?”

“No.”

“But there were words?”

“Loud ones. And bad ones,” Mulder said, “After which, Amy stormed out of the bar.”

“And her ex-boyfriend?” Scully asked.

“He stormed out after her.”

“Alibi?”

“He has none,” Mulder said, shrugging his shoulders.

“Is he in custody?”

“Yes.”

“So, we have an angry ex-boyfriend. Dozens of witnesses. It seems like a fairly open and shut ‘crime of passion’ homicide, doesn’t it?” Scully asked.

“By all appearances,” Mulder said.

“Then, I suppose there’s a reason you were standing in a freezing parking lot on Thanksgiving morning.” Scully waited for Mulder’s response.

“The ex-boyfriend describes seeing a strange woman at the scene of the crime. He says she just disappeared.”

“Did he provide a description?” Scully asked.

Mulder nodded. “Average height. Mid to late forties. She had one distinguishing characteristic. A streak of white in her hair.”

“Did you put out an APB?”

“No,” Mulder said.

“Why not?” Scully asked.

“Because she disappeared.”

“You just said the same thing twice.”

“When I say ‘disappeared,’ you should be taking that word ‘literally.” Mulder continued, “According to the witness, the woman sank into the snow and her body faded into nothingness. As though it were never there in the first place.”

“What I fail to see Mulder is how you can look past the multiple witnesses who saw a heated altercation and instead focus on the absurd story put out there by the suspect,” she said. 

“Scully,” he said. “There was another murder twelve miles from here, just this morning. A young man. 18 years old. Kurt DeForrest. Do you know what two witnesses in that case had to say?”

“I wouldn’t dare venture a guess,” Scully said. 

“That the suspect vanished… into thin air.”

“Just like that?” Scully asked.

“Just like that,” Mulder responded, snapping his gloved finger.

Scully sighed. “I suppose you want to talk to the ex-boyfriend.

Mulder smiled, “Fire up the Willie Nelson and let’s go on the road again.”

Scully shifted the car into reverse, then back to drive and headed towards the main street. She turned to Mulder. “By the way, there’s something in that bag for you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Chapter: Mulder and Scully interrogate the prime suspect in the murder of Amy Weaver.


	4. The Morning Interrogation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While Scully interrogates the main suspect in the murder of Amy Weaver, Mulder focuses on a seemingly insignificant detail.

Mulder stood in the kitchen of the police station. Through a small window over the sink, he could see the sun breaking over the horizon. He touched the glass. It was moist and frosty against his hand. He walked over to a pumpkin orange table and sat opposite Scully, as she stifled a yawn. They went over their notes.

“What’s the suspect’s name?” Scully asked.

“Ryan Donnelly,” Mulder said. “22 years old… did a year at the University of Illinois, dropped out, came back home to work at his Dad’s business.”

“Does he have any priors?” Scully asked.

Mulder shook his head. “No.”

Just then, Sheriff Thompson appeared in the doorway. “That’s not entirely true,” he said. He was big and bulky with a dark head of hair and dark brown eyes that seemed incapable of hiding secrets. But now, they were weary, with scarlet circles. 

“Mind if I sit down?” the sheriff asked.

“We’re your guests,” Mulder said, rising up. “Agent Scully, this is Sheriff Thompson.”

Scully stood as well. They shook hands. It went on for a few seconds longer than it should have. Scully looked at Thompson and those scarlet circles overshadowing the kind brown. “Is everything alright?” she asked.

“Sorry…” he said. “Just finished informing the victim’s family. Amy was their only daughter. Actually, I went to high school with her Dad… and Mom… I know you folks are from DC but around here… everyone knows everyone.” 

The agents nodded. They’d been to countless towns like this before and they knew the way murders reverberated through the people. It was a tragic game of telephone where the collective grief hung cut through the phone lines and infected the very air the citizens breathed.

Thompson walked over to the coffee pot, pulled an Illinois PD mug with a worn gold foil stamp from the cabinet and poured himself a cup. 

“You said the suspect has priors?” Scully asked.

Thompson sat down opposite them. “They won’t be in any of the official reports. His father saw to that. Every time Junior gets in trouble, he comes in here, starts threatening to have my badge. He ruffled enough feathers that, both times, I was told by higher ups to drop the case.” He leaned back in his chair, reached into his coat and pulled out a manilla folder, “Something about that spoiled little brat rubs me the wrong way. So, I kept all of the redacted reports.”

Mulder and Scully opened the folder and read through Sheriff Thompson’s hand-written notes. As far as Scully was concerned, this was further proof that Ryan’s initial story was bogus. There was no “invisible woman.” This was a jealous young man taking out his anger on a vulnerable ex, walking home alone at night. She absorbed each horrifying detail like it was fire that she could spit back at him when he called her a liar, like they always did. 

She was ready to face him.

* * * * *

Scully walked down the hallway and towards the door labeled ‘Sheriff Thompson.’ Inside, Ryan Donnelly sat behind the desk. There was no interrogation room. Really, they had no need for one until this very moment. Mulder and Scully sat opposite him, while Sheriff Thompson stood in the doorway, staring down at this supposed murderer.

“I already told the Sheriff, I want to talk to my father. I want my lawyer!” Ryan screamed, as soon as they opened the door.

“We don’t work for the Sheriff, Mr. Donnelly,” Scully said. “We work for the United States government.” She showed him her badge. He backed down, intimidated.

“I didn’t kill her,” he said, outright.

“We have several witnesses who described an altercation,” Scully said.

“I’m not talking about this anymore,” Ryan said. 

“Talk to me about this,” Scully said. She dropped the file on the table with a thud. Usually, Mulder was the theatrical one but in this situation, Scully’s anger got the best of her.

“Where did you get that?” Ryan asked, he looked up at Sheriff Thompson. He puffed out his nostrils and clenched his thin lips. 

“We have two women who describe your history of violence,” Scully asked, pointing to the files. 

“It’s not like that this time!” Ryan said.

“Was Amy your first girlfriend?”

“I didn’t care about Amy!” he said, without prompt. “She was psycho.”

“You think all women are like that?” Scully asked.

“No, I don’t.” He paused. “Amy was different. She said crazy things all the time… She thought she was special… She wasn’t special.”

“What about the next girl you dated?” Scully read off the file, “Jennifer Collins. Was she ‘crazy’ too?” 

Ryan didn’t respond. Scully pressed on, “She called the police on October 2nd, 1994. She said you were drunk. You were angry that you saw her talking to a male acquaintance.”

“He was NOT just an acquaintance,” Ryan said through gritted teeth. 

Mulder was impressed. Scully was chiseling away at this suspect as though he was a hunk of marble, with a dark secret buried deep in its center. At this rate, they’d be back in D.C. just in time for Thanksgiving dinner.

“Is that why you hit her so hard you gave her a subconjunctival hemorrhage?” Scully asked.

Ryan gestured towards Sheriff Thompson, “He was not supposed to put that in there.” He snarled, “Now, my Dad will make sure that he has to suffer the consequences.”

“Oh, enough,” Sheriff Thompson sighed. “I’m up for election next year. If your Dad wants to run someone against me, let him try.”

Scully flipped over to the next sheet of handwritten notes. “Another girlfriend. Tracy Hopkins. Said you got so angry at her that you grabbed her.” She picked up two Polaroid photos. “Scratch marks. Bruises. There’s more…” Scully paused. Reading over this next part. Making sure that she didn’t miss a detail. “She claims that you forced yourself on her.”

Ryan shook his head. No words escaped his mouth.

“And these are just the women that came forward,” Mulder added. “How many haven’t? How many have been afraid to because your father will always cover up for you?”

“No… These things… They’re not…” He breathed. Righted himself. Tried to steady his voice. Then, he spoke clearly. “I’ve made mistakes in the past. But what I saw. Last night... I did not do. Amy’s throat was...” He stopped himself. Tears were welling up in his eyes. “Ripped apart. I saw her… Dead… On the ground… I saw this woman… I told him…” he said, pointing to Sheriff Thompson. “I told him everything! This woman disappeared. I saw it! I saw her vanish!”

Mulder leaned in, “We have your description of the woman. Middle aged. Streak of white in her hair. Is there anything else you can remember about her?”

“No,” Ryan said. The room was quiet as Ryan sobbed under his breath. Scully looked over at her partner. She could tell he was mulling over something in his mind. His grey eyes moving rapidly. Mulder had found a small thread hanging in Ryan’s interview. He decided now was the time to pull on that thread and see where it led him.

Mulder dropped his hand on the desk and looked at Ryan. “What do you mean that Amy thought she was ‘special’?” Mulder asked.

“I don’t know,” Ryan responded, almost on instinct. Then, he peeled back a little more. “She felt things… said her emotions were deeper than other people’s... Said she could remember the past in a way that others couldn’t… almost like reliving them… like a 3D movie.”

“How did that make you feel?” Mulder asked.

“I thought it sounded stupid. She got upset at me. She broke up with me. She said it wasn’t because of that… but I knew it was.”

Scully continued on the narrative that she believed, “So, last night, you followed her outside. Witnesses described that you were angry when you left.”

“I was,” he confessed.

“Did you want to hurt her?” Scully asked.

“Stop…”

“Did you want to show her that you were in charge?” Scully pressed.

“I want my lawyer…”

“What did you plan to do when you went out there, Ryan? What was going to make you feel like you were the one in control?”

“For the last time --- I didn’t kill her!” he screamed.

There was a silence in the room. Then, Mulder said something that shocked his partner. That caused the Sheriff to leave the room in disgust.

“I believe you,” Mulder said. 

Ryan looked up at him with desperate eyes. 

Just then, there was a man yelling in the hallway. 

It was Ryan’s father. He had his lawyer with him. Now, Scully was sure of one thing.

The interrogation was over. 

As she rose up to leave the room, their prime suspect stopped her. “Wait,” he said. “I remember something else about this woman… she was crying.”

* * * * *

“It’s an act,” Scully said.

“If that was an act, he deserves a Blockbuster Award,” Mulder said. 

They were at a Denny’s, just off the highway. This was to be their Thanksgiving, spent together at a cheap restaurant with a crowd of truck drivers and a wait staff that looked like they’d rather be at home with the people they loved.

Mulder, feeling traditional, ordered the turkey and stuffing. Scully, indifferent to this tradition, went with the Grand Slam breakfast. They both had coffee. It was mediocre. Mulder sometimes wondered what would happen if he were killed in the line of duty and his partner had to perform the autopsy. When she sliced him open, would she find his veins full of lousy coffee from gas stations, truck stops and fast food restaurants?

Scully ran through her notes. “A young male. History of domestic abuse. He sees his high school girlfriend at a bar. The one that got away. He tries to talk to her. She embarasses him in front of their entire hometown. He figures, ‘What does she care? She’s leaving after Thanksgiving. But I’m going to stay here. I’m going to stay here the rest of my life.’ He grows enraged.”

“I see where you’re going, Scully,” Mulder said.

“Ryan killed her,” she said.

“I’m not so sure,” he responded.

“You don’t see the evidence?” she asked.

“I see what you describe as evidence, yes,” he said. “I fully believe that Ryan walked out into that cold night to harm Amy Weaver. Maybe even… force himself on her, as he’s done before. But, I believe she was murdered before he could act on his worst impulses.”

“Murdered by who?” Scully asked.

At that very moment, their food arrived. They thanked their waitress and Scully looked back down at her notes. At the counter, she saw a group of men gathered around a small television set, watching the Detroit Lions take on the Dallas Cowboys. They were drawn into the game, cheering for the Lions and booing the Cowboys.

“Hey Scully,” Mulder said.

She looked up at him. She knew what he wanted to say. Something like, ‘Mind if I go watch the game? It’s a big one. I wanted to get tickets. But this case kind of took me away from that.’ Then, he would leave her sitting here, alone, with her own thoughts on this dark case, while he talked to the men sitting around the 13-inch television set about the details of the game.

Instead, he surprised her.

“Happy Thanksgiving,” he said. Then, he added, “Let’s talk turkey.” She smiled. They ate their meals and talked about their own families and their holiday traditions. For the first time since she arrived here, everything seemed normal.

That feeling would not last. As Mulder was ordering dessert, Sheriff Thompson called. There had been another murder. A 17 year old female. And, according to the only witnesses --- the suspect vanished into thin air.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Chapter: Who is the next murder victim?


	5. Sapphire Blue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As a girl named Molly King retires to her bedroom after a tough Thanksgiving, the mystery caller named 'David' plots his next move.

Molly King was getting ready for bed, after having spent an achingly long Thanksgiving dinner at her grandparent’s house. As usual, her Uncle Rich had one too many ‘vodka and Mr. Pibb’s.’ As usual, he started running his mouth off about politics and religion and ancient family squabbles. And, as usual, her Dad got in his face. 

She’d barely digested her cranberry sauce when she watched as her old man reached over the table, grabbed his younger brother by the shirt collar and attempted to pull him one-handed over the turkey carcass. 

“You son of a bitch! I’ll kick your ass!” her Dad yelled.

“You been tryin’ for years and you ain’t done it yet!” her Uncle Rich yelled back.

The wives intervened. The men calmed down. Later, she observed them on the back porch, smoking cigarettes together, drinking more vodkas and Mr. Pibbs and acting like nothing happened. She couldn't stand her uncle. He always gave her the creeps.

She kept asking her Mom, “Can we go already?”

But her Mom responded, “Not ‘til I eat some pumpkin pie.”

Did anyone have a weirder family than her? She didn’t think so.

Molly didn’t say a word on the drive home. When they walked inside, she went straight up to her bedroom and locked the door. She rubbed her knuckles into her eyelids then peered at her face in the mirror. Her sapphire blue eyes were strained. ‘Screw this family,’ she thought to herself.

She just wanted to call it a night. She popped open the jewel case for her ‘Jagged Little Pill’ CD, placed it into her boombox, closed the lid, hit play and sunk under her comforters. As ‘All I Really Want’ filled her room, she was ready to let this day leave her mind.

Then, she felt a hand over her mouth. It was bony. It was cold. She tried to scream, but the ghoul under her bed clamped around her mouth even tighter. Molly regretted locking her bedroom door now. Even if her parents did hear her cries for help, by the time they were able to break the door open, it might be too late. This was on her. She had to keep herself alive. As she felt her heart race and she struggled for air, she dug her nails into the hand.

The monster under her bed now climbed up on top of her. She pinned Molly to the ground, as she pulled a knife from her side. Now, Molly really tried to scream. Oh boy, did she ever try to scream. She wanted to stay alive. She fought with every ounce of strength in her tiny frame. 

The woman spoke to her.

“It’s okay,” the woman said. “Don’t struggle,” the woman said. “This is all for the best.”

Molly bit into the fleshy part of the woman’s hand. She tasted the metallic crimson. The woman’s hand was now free from her face. Molly was panicked… the words caught in her breath… finally, she was able to scream, “Mom! Dad! Help!!!”

She heard their heavy steps thundering up the stairs. Her Dad’s large mitt shook the brass doorknob violently. “Molly! Open up! Molly!” He hit the door so hard that she thought he was going to punch straight through it.

Molly managed to get off the bed. She leapt for the quaking doorknob. She was almost there. That’s when she felt the woman grab her by the ankle with a deadly force. Molly put her hands up to defend herself.

The woman plunged the knife straight into Molly’s heart. 

Molly could not struggle anymore.

Her Dad was close to breaking down the door. Molly was impressed. He really did love her. As weird and crazy as today was, her Dad was fighting to get to her. 

The woman stroked Molly’s hair. She said, “Shhh, shhh.” She seemed to be crying as she watched the teen make a futile attempt to remove the knife searing her chambers.

Molly was grateful for one thing. That this woman was here for her as she died. She liked the way the woman looked at her, tenderly, as the last breaths escaped her body. 

The last thing Molly noticed were the woman’s sapphire blue eyes.

* * * * *

Mulder and Scully arrived at the scene of Molly King’s murder an hour after it happened. They found her parents inconsolable in the living room, sobbing, gasping for air, just as their daughter had done in the last few minutes of her life.

Through the pained cries of her father, they were able to make out one thing that he said about her beloved daughter’s killer.

“She disappeared… I opened the door… she vanished… into thin air…”

Mulder looked to Scully. She was scared to admit that her partner’s hunch was right. 

But, who was responsible?

* * * * *

“David” was not his real name.

Last night, he was determined to tell his entire story on Rising Run Radio. But, he was spooked by voices in the bus station. He spent the entire day looking for her… for Cassie. He had to find her before it was too late. He had to tell her what happened when he’d tried to murder Eric. It was important that she knew.

He had visited all of the places that she had told him about when they first started dating. He remembered that she told him she spent most Thanksgivings at her parent’s house. The address was burned into his memory. “10 Willow Street.” Willow. Like the tree. Ten, like the age he was when the bad things started happening to him. But, when he arrived at the house, the lights were off. Maybe this was an off year? Maybe they had spent this Thanksgiving at a grandparent’s house… or an aunt’s… or a cousin’s. Maybe, he had the address wrong. This journey he had taken had certainly seemed to scramble his memory. 

This plan had failed. He was not able to find Cassie. 

So, he was back to his first plan. 

He was going to call in to Rising Sun Radio once again.

He passed the hours, quietly. He tried to sleep but his paranoia kept jolting him awake. What if they found him here? 

He washed his face in the restroom. He looked at the mirror. Had it really been twenty-five years? It didn’t seem possible. He had spent so much time pretending everything was okay. But the pain was always just below the skin. This pain that fueled the locomotive he seemed to be strapped to that, driven by hate and hurt. He wanted it to end. 

That was the whole point of this trip. Wasn’t it? That’s why he needed to kill Eric.

He bought a package of Wise potato chips and a can of orange pop from the vending machine. He wasn’t able to finish the chips but the soda went down easy. He needed the sugar. He needed to stay awake.

He sifted through a garbage can and found today’s newspaper. There was a story on the front page that grabbed him. A woman had been murdered last night. The morning edition went out before her parents had been informed so the victim was not identified but he was sure that they were referring to Amy Weaver. The paper ended by saying that while no arrests had been made police were questioning a suspect. They had already named Kurt DeForrest as the victim in Wednesday morning’s murder.

He found a pay television set on some seats in the lobby and put in a few quarters. He watched the news. They talked about a young woman that was found murdered tonight. Police couldn’t say her name but he suspected it was Molly King. It had to be Molly King. It was all going according to plan.

He spoke to a man, briefly, in the lobby of the bus station. This man said he was homeless. That Thanksgiving Day was his favorite time at this station because it was empty. He could hear himself think. He rarely got quiet moments anymore. The streets were noisy. The shelter was noisy. But the bus station on Thanksgiving Day was his church.

“You’re not with your family?” the man asked him.

“I don’t get along with my family,” ‘David’ responded. “Too many skeletons in the closet.”

The homeless man nodded, a look of complete understanding on his warm face. He turned on his radio and listened to classical music. 

‘David’ looked up at the clock above the lockers. It was almost 2AM. He prepared himself. He had to make sure that Cassie heard him. He had a feeling that she was listening last night. She must have been. The pure nostalgia of this time and place would have made her want to experience everything again. 

Or at least, he hoped that was the case.

‘David’ walked over to the payphone. He closed the door behind him and sat down. He spoke to the operator and asked her to make a collect call to the number that Peter Stack seemed to repeat every five seconds on his radio show. She patched him through and he was talking to the same producer that he talked to last night. She accepted the charges.

“David,” she said. “Happy to hear from you. After last night, we were worried we’d never hear from you again.” She had the kind of voice that immediately put someone at ease. He could picture her being a successful therapist, were she not producing this show.

“Hello,” he said into the line. “Are you doing a live show today?”

“We are,” she responded.

“I’m surprised you’re not doing a rerun, what, with the holiday,” he said.

“Peter’s pursuit of the truth never ends,” she responded. “Besides,” she laughed, “Thanksgiving night is when we usually get our best rating. Folks on vacation from work. Kids home from school. They pop some leftovers in the microwave and go on a spooky journey through the world of the unknown.”

“Good,” he said. “I want a big audience for this.”

“You sound like Peter,” she laughed, again.

“It’s not that…” he continued… “I’m trying to reach someone. Someone special.”

“Does this someone have a name?” she asked.

“Cassie,” he responded.

“Let me guess… the girl you’re in love with?” she asked.

“Yes,” David responded. 

“Strange way of telling her, don’t you think? But, who am I to judge? We had a guy on the show last week who said he was a werewolf and his girlfriend was a vampire.”

“This isn’t like that,” David said. He was surprised that he was laughing. It had been so long. “I need to stop her from making a big mistake.”

“That will certainly make for good radio,” she said. “So, I’m about to put you through to Peter. And the girl you want to reach is ‘Cassie’?”

“Yes,” he said.

“And your name is David.”

He took a heavy breath. “I want to use my real name tonight,” he said. “I want her to know that it’s me.”

“We can do that,” she said. “What’s your real name?” she asked.

He looked out into the station. It was empty. He felt safe to tell the truth.

“My real name is Eric.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What will 'David' say on the new episode of Rising Sun Radio?


	6. The Support Group

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mulder and Scully race to find the mysterious caller that now refers to himself as Eric.

Scully heard the brutal pounding on her door. Her first instinct was to reach for her service revolver. Then, she heard a voice attached to the knocking.

“Scully, it’s me! Open up!”

Mulder. This was so Mulder.

She was in Room 25 at the Stay and Save Motel, which was certainly not one of the more upscale establishments they’d ever had the pleasure of checking into. She had fallen asleep above the covers with the television on mute, as she often did at these places. The snowy static gave birth to rolling shadows on the wall.

Scully glanced at the clock radio on her nightstand. Through her blurred vision, she could make out a bright red 2:14AM. Was he kidding? 

“Okay! Okay!” she said.

She rose out of bed, threw on the bubblegum pink bathrobe that came with the room and opened the door. Her partner was standing there in his gray T-shirt and navy blue gym shorts, his eyes wide.

“I need you to come to my room,” he said.

“Not gonna happen,” she responded, curtly.

“Then, we’ll listen in here,” he said. He walked past her, leapt over the bed, grabbed the clock radio and turned it on. He glided through the dial, surfing the wave of static. Then, he stopped on a station.

It was Rising Sun Radio. This again.

“Last night, when you were listening, did you hear a caller named ‘David’?” Mulder asked.

“Yes,” Scully said. “Briefly. He sounded genuinely distressed.”

“He said he knows who murdered Amy Weaver,” Mulder said.

Scully sat at the edge of the bed while Mulder knelt in front of the nightstand as though he had the ability to jump inside of the radio and reach the caller.

“If you’re just joining us, we’re here with my guest, Eric,” Peter Stack said, his voice, dark as lava cake, cutting through the night. 

“Eric?” Scully asked her partner.

“It’s his real name. David was a pseudonym,” Mulder explained.

Peter Stack continued. “You need to slow down, Eric. Explain this to me again. If we have to wait until the break of dawn to get the full truth, then that is what we will do.”

Eric’s big breath was audible over the phone. “I was in a support group for trauma survivors,” he explained. “We met every week in this dingy church basement in Chicago. Sometimes, we’d hear the rats scratching inside of the walls. But, it’s the only place most of us felt safe.”

“And why is that?” Peter Stack asked.

“We talked about our problems. We huddled together for warmth. In that room, we were all the same. We were all… well… abuse survivors. But there was one member of the group who was different. She was kind of our… well, we called her own den mother.” Eric’s two day-old stubble scratched against the phone as he put his face closer to the receiver. “Her name was Amy Weaver.”

“You knew the deceased?” Stack asked.

“Very well,” Eric responded.

“When you say that she was different, please elaborate.”

As Eric talked to Peter Stack, Mulder placed a call to Sheriff Thompson on the motel’s phone line. At the top of the show, Eric had mentioned that he was calling from a pay phone in a bus station. The sheriff, who was awoken by Mulder’s call, said he had a hunch that he knew the bus station that Eric was speaking of. Mulder reached for the yellowed Stay & Save Motel stationery next to the rotary phone. Scully watched as he wrote down the address.

Mulder turned to Scully and said, “Sheriff Thompson is sending a patrol car to that location right now. I’ll get dressed. I’ll meet you in my car in less than five?”

Scully nodded. Mulder hightailed it back to his room and she could hear as he turned up the volume of his radio. It ripped through the paper-thin walls. Eric continued to speak of the woman that he knew as Amy Weaver. “She had a way of internalizing not only her pain… but our pain. She felt trauma in ways that no other person I’ve ever met could feel trauma. And, when she felt our pain strongly enough… it was like she could take you back to that moment. To the moment when everything changed for you.”

Scully removed the bubblegum bathrobe. Underneath, she was wearing an army green camisole and a pair of black pajama pants. She removed the shirt and a fine layer of goosebumps arose on her creamy skin, surely a result of the ice cold Illinois weather. Scully walked to the dresser and dug through her luggage, which rested atop it. She retrieved a black bra from her suitcase and slipped it on.

“You’re speaking of PTSD?” Stack asked his call-in guest. “The way we described our brave soldiers when they came home from the Vietnam War?”...

Scully dropped her pants and changed into her work uniform.

… “Shell-shocked, as they called it after World War II,” Peter Stack continued. “A smell. A sound. Anything could trigger you… take you back to the moment in time when you stormed the beaches of Normandy or when your best friend died in your arms in the jungle.”

Scully closed the motel room door behind her, locked up, and ran down the stairs to find Mulder sitting in the rental car waiting for her. The volume of the car’s radio was so high she could hear it through the windows, ricocheting off the other cars in the parking lot.

“Amy had a special ability,” she heard Eric say.

Scully sat in the passenger seat as Mulder backed up and drove onto the main street. He drove quickly through the fog towards the bus station.

Neither said a word. They listened intently to the radio, Scully taking mental notes as Mulder drove.

“When you talked to her about your problems, Amy would start crying. She would place her hand on your arm… and it’s like… it’s like you were there. You were in your childhood bedroom. You could see your…” Eric paused. He choked back his tears. “You could see your stepfather in the doorway again. Drunk. Desperate,” Eric composed himself. “You would see that moment from the point of view of an outsider.”

“A sort of… well... an emotional time travel?” Peter Stack asked, trying to understand it himself.

“That’s a great way to describe it, actually,” Eric responded. “She had the ability to almost turn her body into a time machine… using your own trauma as the fuel.”

Scully angrily turned to Mulder, “You’re not telling me you believe this?”

“Remember what Amy’s ex-boyfriend said?” Mulder asked. “That she felt things in ways that no other people do.”

“This is pure fiction,” she said. “A disturbed individual who read about Amy Weaver’s case. Now, he’s tying it into the narrative that he spun on last night’s radio show. A lonely person, looking for attention.”

“How would he know these details about her? Details that we only found out today.” Mulder asked.

Scully shook her head. It couldn’t be true. There was no rational explanation for this. “Maybe Eric knows our suspect. Maybe he’s trying to provide an alibi for him, with this absurd story.”

“Scully, you said it yourself. He called last night. He sounded genuinely distressed,” Mulder said. 

“Let’s find him, then, and question him ourselves. Without all of this pomp and circumstance,” she said, dismissively waving a hand at the radio.

Eric continued on, “As we opened up, the six of us in this group, we realized something. For all of us, the first incidence of trauma… be it physical abuse or, in Amy’s case, sexual abuse… occurred in the same week of the same month of the same year. Thanksgiving week. We were all connected by this date. Like, we were destined to be brought together.”

“So, you were all linked by this abuse… trauma?” Peter asked.

“Yes,” Eric continued, “And according to Amy, the people that hurt us… they were living off of our pain. Like… vampires. As young adults, we all struggled… with pain, with self-harm, with drug addiction, with alcoholism. We descended.”

“And what happened to your abusers, Eric?”

“They ascended. The man that hurt Amy became an elected official. The man that hurt me had a successful business. Nobody saw them for the monsters they were. And it was us… it was our trauma that was feeding them.” He breathed in again. That two-day old stubble dancing across the phone lines. “Amy said there was only one way to end this cycle.”

Peter Stack stopped him, “Now, Eric. You had told us at the top of this broadcast that you knew, for certain, who murdered Amy Weaver. Police have a suspect in custody. Is he the murderer?”

“No,” Eric said, unequivocally. “But, not for lack of trying. See, according to Amy, that was the night. Thanksgiving night 1995. He sexually assaulted her. He left her for dead. He left her with scars inside and outside. So, Amy went back to change that.”

“I’m afraid I’ve lost you here,” Peter Stack said. 

“The only way for Amy to stop feeling the pain was to stop it before it happened,” Eric said. Scully could tell that the man on the other end of the phone was growing more desperate as he tried to explain the story.

“But who did it? Who murdered Amy Weaver?” Peter Stack asked.

“Mr. Stack, please!” he said. “Mr. Stack, you’re the only one who can understand! Why don’t you understand?!”

“I am trying, Eric,” Stack said. “I honestly and truly am. But I’m afraid you’re not making any sense. You’re saying Amy Weaver had some sort of psychic vision about her own… well… I hate to say this word on air…” For a brief second, Scully heard Peter Stack’s facade slip. He was no longer the husky-voiced keeper of the strange secrets of the night. He was just a man. A man who may have been in over his head. “Okay,” he breathed, steadying himself. “Your saying that Amy Weaver tried to stop her own… rape. She had a premonition? But, then, why is Amy Weaver dead? Who murdered her?”

“Don’t you get it?! Don’t you remember?! I told you on our first call! WE ARE DISPLACED!” Eric yelled.

“Displaced from what?” Stack asked. 

Eric felt like he was going to pass out. Electric tingles went up his back. He didn’t know how much it would hurt to reveal the truth that he’d kept bottled inside. He screamed into the phone so loudly that his cries muffled the next parts of the call and many listeners were unable to make out the next few sentences.

But Mulder and Scully heard them clear as a bell.

“Time! WE ARE DISPLACED FROM TIME!”

“Eric, please,” Stack said, in his buttery tone. “I get it now. I understand. But I only need to know one thing. Please, just tell me this one thing, Eric, and then I will end this call, if that would calm you down. I’m only concerned with you, dear Eric. Do you understand? Answer me this one question. Okay?”

“Okay, Mr. Stack,” Eric responded. To Scully, he sounded like a broken little boy. She wondered if this was the voice he used when the abuse first started in his life.

“Please tell me who murdered Amy Weaver,” Stack said, softly. There was no more artifice. There were no more tricks. The show was over. Peter Stack was just that late-night disc jockey that accidentally stumbled upon a kooky conspiracy theorist gimmick. He was struggling to keep it up while he felt shivers of terror crawling up and down his throat. He fumbled for a nearby garbage can, certain he was about to lose his Thanksgiving dinner.

Then, Eric responded to his question.

“Amy Weaver murdered Amy Weaver! And Kurt DeForrest murdered Kurt DeForrest! And Molly King murdered Molly King! The only way for them to stop the pain was to stop the abuse before it happened! They murdered themselves… But I couldn’t do it… I saw myself as a ten year-old and I couldn’t go through with it… oh God!”  
Stack managed to squeak out one more question, “Who is Cassie?”

“Cassie is the love of my life. She came here to murder the five-year old version of herself and I need her to know that she can’t do it! Baby, please don’t do it! This isn’t right! Amy Weaver was wrong! Cassie, please ---”

And then, it was over. 

Eric screamed a blood-curdling scream. 

Peter Stack threw up a mixture of turkey, stuffing and artificially colored cranberry sauce. It was bright red. His producer cut to a song. This time, it was the Rolling Stone’s ‘Sympathy for the Devil.’ 

Mulder and Scully were gobsmacked. What the hell did they just hear?

‘Could it be true?’ Mulder wondered. ‘Had these trauma survivors gone back in time to murder the younger versions of themselves?’ 

Then, he spoke a few words aloud to Scully. 

“Amy murdered Amy. Kurt murdered Kurt. Molly murdered Molly. The murderers disappeared because they were erased from existence.”

By the time they arrived at the bus station, Eric was dead. His throat had been sliced wide open. The one witness, a homeless man sleeping on a bench, did not say that Eric’s killer disappeared. Instead, he described a large man with a black beard who effortlessly cut open Eric’s throat then walked out of the bus station into the black night, as though nothing had happened.

Eric’s murderer was still alive.

And Mulder and Scully were determined to find him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who murdered Eric?


	7. The Makeshift Morgue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While Mulder and Scully wait for the officers to build a temporary autopsy room, they discuss their new theories on the case. But, they soon realize that the clock is ticking.

Friday, November 24th, 1995

At the police station, Mulder and Scully waited as the officers converted a storage space into a makeshift morgue where Scully could perform an autopsy. This wasn’t the ideal situation... but it would have to do. They draped a blue plastic tarp over a folding table. They brought in a few desk lamps and floor lamps.

As the agents waited, they settled into the crammed kitchen again. Mulder couldn’t shake a single image from his head. Eric, dead on the floor of the bus station, his throat cut so deep he was nearly beheaded. But he was still gripping onto that telephone… as tight as if he were still alive. What was so important? What message did he have to relay?

On the call, he kept mentioning the name “Cassie.”

Mulder thought about looking deep into the dead man’s open eyes. Stricken with fear. With pain. With terror. And Mulder wasn’t sure if he was projecting or if he had a genuine psychic feeling, he could almost read the words “Save Cassie” in Eric’s eyes.

They were too late to the scene. How angry Mulder was with himself. Scully’s initial assessment was that Eric had been murdered just a handful of minutes before. What if he had listened to the radio sooner? What if he had reacted just a little quicker? Then, Eric wouldn’t be in a body bag, waiting to be diced open in a dim storage space in one of the smallest police stations they’d ever visited.

And, more than that, they would have answers. They would know whether or not he was telling the truth about what he’d spoken about on the Rising Sun Radio show.

Could it be possible? Could they be dealing with an actual group of time travelers?

It seemed almost too sci-fi, even for him. After all, this wasn’t a late-night rerun of 'Star Trek' or 'Time Tunnel' (though God knows he’d seen countless hours of those). This was real life. And, though they’d seen endless loops of supernatural, unexplained phenomena in their travels through this strange country, he had never once felt like he’d met someone capable of folding time and space into one.

Until now.

His ruby-haired partner, however, had a more logical explanation.

“It’s a murder-suicide cult centered around trauma,” she said, over a cheap fast-food breakfast on that small Halloween pumpkin-colored table.

“Hey Scully, has anyone ever told you that you look like the Wendy’s girl,” he said, holding up his coffee cup to her face and squinting.

“Not funny, Mulder,” she responded.

“So, you believe what Eric said to Peter Stack... it was all a lie?” Mulder asked.

“I believe that he thinks it’s true,” Scully said. “But that doesn’t mean it is.” Scully leaned back in her chair. She folded her arms. She ran through the case in her head then laid out her hypothesis as Mulder, as clear as summer rain. “This man, Eric, was part of a trauma survivor group, yes. I believe that. I believe that he suffered some sort of abuse in early childhood. And, I believe that in this group, they all felt that if they could have stopped that abuse before it occurred, then they would be able to live normal lives.”

“Okay,” Mulder said. “I’m with you.”

Scully continued. “I suspect the woman who may have murdered Amy Weaver was the leader of this trauma group.”

“You now admit that Ryan didn’t murder her?” Mulder asked.

“I did not say that,” Scully said, firmly.

“But, for your new theory to work…” Mulder pressed.

Scully was caught. “For my new theory to work then, yes, Ryan Donnelly would be innocent.”

“And yesterday you looked at me like I was crazy,” Mulder said.

“You might still be,” Scully responded. “To build off your initial assessment, I believed that Ryan did intend to sexually assault… maybe even murder… Amy Weaver on the night in question.”

“But?” Mulder asked.

“But, someone beat him to the punch, so to speak,” Scully conceded.

“Who do you think that could be?” Mulder asked.

“My theory? This group leader that Eric spoke of. She’d suffered severe trauma and abuse in childhood. Severe enough to convince herself… and others... that she was capable of going back into the past to stop it.”

“On the radio show, Eric said she could cause someone to relive their past… an almost psychic intuition,” Mulder interjected.

Scully sighed. “Clearly, these were damaged people, looking for answers. In my belief, it wouldn’t take much to convince them that she had those answers. Obviously, you should look no further than your own fascination with cults…”

“It’s not a fascination,” Mulder responded, defensively. “More of a casual interest.”

“Then the stack of books in your apartment on everything from Jonestown to the Mansons is just like, what, the way my Dad used to do jigsaw puzzles to blow off steam?” Scully asked.

“Now you’re just being rude,” Mulder said, taking another sip of his coffee to hide his smile.

“Look at it this way,” Scully said, leaning over. “The group leader convinced everyone that they needed to go back in time and murder their past selves. Why? What logic would it serve to do this when, if they could time travel, they merely needed to stop the abuse before it happened.”

“What if it wasn’t that easy?” Mulder asked. “What if they knew that the cycle of abuse would be hard… almost impossible... to disrupt?”

“Mulder, I can sit here and poke holes in your theory all day. But, here’s what I believe happened.” Scully leaned forward. “This group leader had been assaulted by a boyfriend in the past. In her mind, she relived the assault over and over again. Perhaps, it was in a bar on a crowded night when she was confronted by her ex-boyfriend.”

“Just like Amy Weaver,” Mulder added.

“Correct,” his partner responded. “She went into that bar on two days ago looking for someone who was about to suffer like she suffered. She witnessed the confrontation, just like everyone else in that bar did. She followed Eric into the night and just as he was about to put his hands on Amy… she intervened. She murdered Amy before her boyfriend could.”

“Ryan described seeing the woman sink into the snow and disappear,” Mulder said.

“Ryan was traumatized. He was in shock,” she responded. “His testimony should not be considered reliable.”

“What about the murders of Kurt DeForrest and Molly King? Witnesses described a similar situation.”

“In my estimation?” she responded. “A collective hysteria. This is a small town. There hasn’t been a murder here in decades. Now, there’s suddenly three?”

“Four,” Mulder said, gesturing in the general direction of the corpse in the storage space.

“People have a hard time believing their own eyes in situations such as this. Besides, Eric was murdered last night. The one witness to that case didn’t say anything about his murderer disappearing. In fact, he said his murderer walked through the door and into the parking lot,” Scully said.

“Unless, his murderer was another member of the group, desperate to silence Eric before he ruined their plans,” Mulder responded. “A fellow traveler,” he added.

“Mulder, while I enjoy discussing the theory of time travel with you over breakfast with a mascot that you claim looks like me…”

“Put you in pigtails and a blue dress and it’s a dead ringer,” he said.

“...I’m going to check in with the Sheriff and see if my autopsy room is ready.”

Scully rose up and walked into the storage room to find it in chaos. The officers were screaming at each other. Scully interjected to try to bring order to this madness. “Look, I know we’re all stressed here! But you have to calm down.”

This did nothing to ease the Sheriff’s nerves. “Agent Scully, you don’t understand.”

“Explain it to me, then,” she said. 

“The body… is gone,” the Sheriff said to her. He gestured for one of his officers to show her. They showed her the unzipped bag. It was empty. There was no trace of blood or skin cells. It was as though a body had never been in there in the first place.

“How the hell did that happen?” she asked.

Mulder walked into the room now, observing all of this. Often, when he entered rooms, he felt like the outsider. He’d heard all the nicknames before. “Spooky.” “The Martian.” “Alien Boy.” Feeling removed from the human race was often a curse… but often also a blessing, as it was here. He watched as the officers scrambled to explain this situation to the FBI agent. 

“That guy was deader than disco!” one said.

“Cadavers don’t just get up and walk away!” another said.

“First you tell me we have a serial killer then you tell me we have body snatchers?” the Sheriff interjected.

But, the Martian, the Alien Boy, Spooky Mulder saw it all clearly.

Whoever murdered Eric in the bus station finished the job he’d started. He murdered Eric, the adult, and then he murdered Eric, the child. Any minute now, the Sheriff would be getting a call about that. "Spooky" was certain of that. And he was certain of one more thing.

If they didn’t act quickly, the next call they would be getting would be about a young girl named Cassie, killed in cold blood.

Would it be by the bearded man?

Or, would it be by a 30 year old woman with crying eyes?

It was up to them to protect her from both.


End file.
